Our Energy Problem (2).

“A friend of mine jokingly asked me: Can Nigeria celebrate one day of continuous (uninterrupted) power supply?

Then I answered: "By God’s grace by December 2012, Nigeria will not just celebrate one day, but one week, one month, and even better. It’s actually with that vision and mission that we are here today to launch the Roadmap for Power Sector Reform.” His Excellency, President Goodluck Jonathan speaking in August, 2010.

In appraising the state of our present power sector, it is proper to situate same on the pre and post Jonathan’s administration in order to have a fair view of the milestones (if any) we have chucked or the apparent stagnation that pervades electricity availability in the country. It is also of great importance to identify the problems hindering effective operations of the three arms of electricity provision in the country. These are the generation, transmission and distribution sub sectors which are synergic in achieving stable electricity. My understanding is that energy is as important as national security and must be bereft of politics at all times. I therefore state without fear of contradiction that one of the problems that has plagued our power sector is the mundane politics of the managers and those waiting in the wings for them to fail. How can a country move forward under this circumstance?

Nigerian politicians and technocrats are guilty of working from the answers to the problems which has a predetermined failure outcome. Electricity provision is not part of those unseen achievements of any government that could be propagandized to prop up an ailing administration. It is a physicality that needs no prodding to identify any positive progression no matter how infinitesimal that might appear. In its 2010 Monitoring, Performance and Evaluation Report for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), the National Planning Commission declared that we require 35,000mw of electricity by 2020 to attain stability in the sector. This declaration was based on our population and in recognition of the present 40,000mw generation by South Africa and 100,000mw by Brazil. The question is at what capacity are we currently generating and the annual increment required to achieve the 2020 target?

In his appraisal of the power sector in 2011, then Minister of Finance, Olusegun Aganga poured cold water on the expectations of Nigerians with his declaration that the current generation capacity of the country at the time was 3,800MW of electricity. This tallied with the Daily Trust report of 22nd February, 2010 and I quote “A summary of power generation performance in 2009 shows that the highest generation of 3,710MW was attained by December 24, 2009 while installed available capacity of 5,226.6MW was reached by December 31, 2009.” Juxtaposing this with pronouncement by the current Minister of Power, Prof. Bath Nnaji that we have recently attained 4,000mw mark, the empirical summation is that we achieved a paltry 290mw generation capacity in two and half years. This is equivalent to 9.7mw per month. Is this how to achieve the 35,000mw in 8 years time?

The government declared in August 2010 that the generation capacity of Nigeria would increase to 7,000mw by April 2011. It is obvious that we are still crawling in our quest to provide electricity for the teeming masses. The fact is that it is unhelpful politicizing electricity generation, transmission and distribution. We also need to ask questions on the progress made so far with regards to the US$3.5billion electricity grid designed to improve transmission. The President authorized this project about 18months ago considering the loss of generated power through archaic and faulty transmission lines. This and proper distribution channels will guarantee the maximum consumption of generated power. We must be clear in our minds that generation of 35,000mw without adequate distribution plan will amount to nothing. The practice of clustered neighbourhoods on an old transformer is a recipe for darkness.

Apart from the lingering seminal talks and kneejerk sacking and redeployment of key personnel in the sector, do we have an alternate roadmap to achieve energy sufficiency both in the short and long terms? The recent shut down of Kanji dam is unacceptable putting into cognizance that we had all the time in the world to effect retrofitting of the entire dam to enhance performance and engender additional megawatts. Must we wait for it to collapse completely before doing the needful in service of our country? The story is not necessarily different from the management of our thermal plants. Combining steam turbines and gas turbines in one thermal plant is cheaper than building a single powered plant. A combined cycle power plant that deploys gas turbines, heat recovery steam generators and steam turbines has advantage of cost, environmental protection and better output.

Furthermore, the Federal Government should to look into new legislation that will free the hands of state governments in this sector. Laws that are friendly to waste energy and other means of power generation are quite essential. It makes absolutely no developmental sense to mandate states to transmit state funded power generation outputs into a bogus national grid that is bedeviled by poor transmission and distribution. The exemption of Rivers State based on the inability of the national grid to carry the generated power is not good enough. What will be the incentive of any state government to proactively pursue provision of electricity for its citizens? This is one of the major constraints militating against improved power generation in the country. If states can build universities, stadia, roads and water projects, why can’t they do same on power generation and control same?

I concur that it is not all the states that will have the capacity to build power plants, but the advantage is that plants built by buoyant states will free generated power in the national grid for transmission to less endowed states. The snail pace of the anticipated reforms is killing the industry and rendering small businesses bankrupt. Allowing states to generate and distribute among their citizens is a surer way of commencing the reforms than the present setup. Considering their limited areas of administration, the states are in a better position to attract private investors in the sector than the federal government. It is easier for the people of Imo state and others to monitor a public-private partnership in power generation than a similar project emanating from Abuja.

Finally, let those that are entrusted with our electricity “show” us the light. We are simply tired of excuses.